And Playing the Role of Herself...

by K E Lane

  I'd arrived about ten minutes early and after pouring myself a glass of water, chatted idly with Josiah Rollins, a short, slightly rotund man with thinning red hair and Micah Saams, a beautiful giant of a man with rich, deep-brown skin and startling green eyes. Both were regular cast members, playing two of the other four detectives on the series besides Liz and me.

  The rest of the regulars sat across from us; Danny DeLorenzo, a loud but undeniably likable Italian ladies man, Henry Stoddard, stocky and strong with a bald head and bushy mustache, and finally Arturo Garza, a former Latin soap opera star with a dazzling smile, charming accent and an ego to match.

  I glanced at my watch. None of the writer's had arrived yet, which was odd. They were usually here before anyone else, eager to pass out script drafts and get first thoughts before the producer or producers showed up. The producers were absent as well, but that was normal, and Liz, of course, would be one of the last people to walk through the door. She always arrived when the dramatic impact of her entrance would be the greatest, and none of us expected her for another twenty minutes at least.

  I smiled slightly as Danny and Henry debated the specifics of the latest story making the rounds of the gossip circuit, involving two crewmembers, several pulleys and a power tool.

  Finally, my goat-loving days appeared to be over. Maybe people would stop bleating behind my back and joking about goat cheese sandwiches during lunch.

  One could only hope.

  The door swung open and Robyn walked in, pausing in the doorway to survey the room.

  "Hey all," she rasped.

  Danny stopped in mid-sentence, and Josiah and Micah fell silent.

  Good god, she was an attractive woman.

  Dark hair held back in a loose braid highlighting the clean angles of her face; a snug, black spaghetti-strap top that showed off miles of gloriously tan skin; faded jeans that covered endless legs, and flat, simple sandals that showed burgundy painted toenails.

  Arturo was the first to recover. "Ah…Robyn. You are a vision, as always. Please, come sit with me."

  He stood and pulled out the chair next to him, bowing gallantly. I rolled my eyes and when I looked back at Robyn, her eyes were on me, and the Mona Lisa smile, tempered with humor, was firmly in place.

  It was good to see her.

  Very, very good.

  And not just because she made my hormones sit up and beg.

  It was more than that. I had genuinely missed her; missed her smile, missed her voice, and missed her presence. And what the hell. Why not tell her? It was the friendly thing to do, wasn't it? It didn't mean I wanted to strip her naked and eat caramel sundaes off of her stomach. Of course it didn't.

  "Hey Robyn, long time." I smiled shyly. "It's good to see you."

  She nodded at me, her mouth twitching into a genuine smile. "Caidence."

  I blushed.

  Goddamnit.

  "Yeah, Robyn, we haven't seen you in a while," Micah's deep voice rumbled, drawing the room's attention away from me. "What brings you here today? We don't normally see you for these prelim things. They gotcha doing something big for the finale?"

  Robyn walked around the table, ignoring the chair Arturo had pulled out, and slid into the chair next to me. It was normally Liz's chair, but I sure as hell wasn't going to say anything.

  "All I know is that I got a message last night to show up here this morning, nine o'clock sharp." She shrugged. "And here I am."

  You certainly are, I thought, taking a sip of water from the glass in front of me, eyeing her surreptitiously while her attention was on Micah.

  "Yes, you certainly are," Arturo said with smooth, perfectly accented charm.

  Oh god. I was a female Arturo.

  I choked as I swallowed, coughing until my eyes watered. Josiah pounded heavily on my back in concern.

  "Take it easy, Joe, you're gonna kill her," Robyn drawled, laying a hand on my arm. Joe stopped thumping on me, and Robyn bent her worried face near my own. "You okay, Caid?"

  "Yeah," I squeaked after a moment and nodded, to busy trying to breathe to react to her nearness, or the fact that this was the first time in memory that she'd used the shortened version of my name.

  "Yo Caid, y'alright there?"

  I raised my head, giving Danny a watery smile. "Yeah, Danny, I'm good."

  I gave one final cough, and blinked rapidly.

  Crap. My throat felt raw, my head hurt, and I was extremely embarrassed.

  But on the bright side, Robyn had her hand on my arm and was looking at me with concern…life could be worse.

  "Water?" She took her hand off me and reached for my glass, still half full on the table.

  "Yeah, thanks."

  Conversation around us started up again as I sipped and swallowed cautiously.

  "Hey." Her voice was soft.

  I looked over questioningly.

  "It's good to see you, too." She gave me a crooked smile, and bumped into my shoulder with her own. "I missed ya."

  It was such a guy thing to do, I couldn't help laughing. Even as the words made my heart beat double-time.

  "Yeah?" I said with a stupid grin.

  "Yeah."

  We sat smiling at each other, and I felt sad and elated at the same time.

  Robyn was beautiful, smart, funny…

  And very, very straight.

  I might never eat caramel sundaes off her stomach, but maybe I'd ask her to go for coffee sometime, or dinner, or a hike, just as friends.

  Because I realized that I sincerely liked Robyn as a friend.

  On impulse, I asked, "You have plans after this? For lunch?"

  "I have to be back at ITD by one-thirty," she answered with a raised eyebrow, but no hesitation.

  "Care to join me on a little trip?"

  "Well, I certainly can't turn that down."

  "Great, I'll…"

  The room fell silent as the show's creator, Grant Hardy, walked in, along with the two other executive producers, two co-exec's and 4 writers, including the head-writer, or showrunner, Dorn Talren.

  What the fuck was going on? Dorn rarely showed for these things, and Grant? Never. And how many executive producers did it take to do a preliminary read of a script?

  I glanced over at Robyn, who looked as perplexed as I was.

  "Good morning everyone!" Grant boomed.

  A chorus of muted greetings accompanied the group as they settled into places around the long table, and Grant surveyed his cast members.

  "Where's Liz?"

  "Right here, Grant," came the reply from the door as Liz entered the room, frowning slightly when she noticed Robyn in the spot next to me. She walked by me, giving my shoulder a squeeze of greeting, and took the vacant seat on the other side of Robyn.

  "Oh, good. I wouldn't want you to miss this. It was, after all, partially your idea." He waved at one of the writers who began distributing copies of the script around the table.

  Liz looked confused for a moment, and then smiled brilliantly. "You liked it?"

  "We sure did. The premise, anyway. We made a few changes that we think will work better."

  Her smile faltered, but she took the offered script with a nod.

  "Now," he boomed. "You're all probably wondering what's going on."

  There were cautious nods around the table, and Grant smiled. "You all know how well the show is doing. We've been in the top five in our time slot all this season, and the numbers just keep getting better. The suits see that as a sign to keep doing things like we're doing them, but I didn't get here by sitting back and being cautious. I see this as an opportunity to take risks, to push the envelope, to see just what we can get away with. This season finale is going to set us up for some big things next year."

  He stood and began pacing. "Our numbers in eighteen to forty-nine are the strongest, and that works perfectly for what we have in mind, since that's a demographic slightly more open-minded than the older or younger dems." He stopped his pacing and leaned his hands on th
e table, catching each cast member's eye. "We're going to take advantage of that, and make television history while we do it."

  He sat down and opened his copy of the script. "Let's get started, shall we?"

  There was an expectant pause, and finally Micah cleared his throat and spoke. "Grant? Are you going to tell us…"

  The creator waved his hand. "No, I want you to look at this fresh, with no preconceptions. Just like the audience will."

  Micah shrugged and opened his script, and the rest of us did the same.

  Scripts were broken up into four acts, each act accounting for approximately fifteen minutes of the show and containing three to five scenes. The script was a good one, revisiting some of the threads from previous shows involving Robyn, and playing up the tension between her character and mine from the infamous wall-slamming scene in 'Snap'.

  The bombshell didn't come until halfway through the fourth act, in the next to final scene.

  The scene was once again between our characters, Rita and Judith, trading barbs during a run-in at Judith's office.

  I read my lines then skipped ahead a bit as Robyn read hers, noting that this time, it was Robyn's character that gets physical, pushing Rita against the wall and…

  I turned the page absently.

  …kissing her.

  I re-read the last few lines, blinking in shock. Beside me, Robyn's voice stuttered to a halt.

  "What!?!" Liz screeched, jolting me out of my dazed state. I looked swiftly over at Robyn.

  She was staring at the pages, her eyes wide and her face very pale.

  "Grant, this was supposed to be me!" Liz fumed. "This story line was for me! Remember our conversation? Me wanting to take a few risks, and branch out a little?"

  "Liz, honey, calm down," the man said soothingly, "we really liked the idea, but when we ran it by our test groups, people just didn't want to see you kissing another woman."

  "But they wanted her?" The words and the look she cast my way were venomous, disbelieving.

  I drew in a sharp breath. It had been a while since I'd been on the receiving end of one of Liz's tirades. I'd forgotten what a bitch she could be.

  "Well, actually, yes. Her character, at least," Grant said, nodding at one of the exec-producers. "Raj?"

  Raj Matis shuffled through some papers in front of him, pulling out a pale blue sheet. "We polled a group of eighteen to thirty-five, and only thirteen percent of the group believed that Jen would kiss a woman, and only two percent thought she would work as a lesbian. For Rita," he glanced at me, "seventy-one percent believed she would kiss a woman, and forty percent thought she worked as a lesbian, with several commenting that they already assumed she was."

  Jesus. Forty percent of the public knew before I did.

  "Numbers for Judith are higher than Jen's, but not nearly as high as Rita's, except when asked specifically about the Judith/Rita pairing - most say the scene in 'Snap' left them wondering."

  "Holy shit!" Danny said, finally cluing into what all the commotion was about. "You're gonna make Caid a lesbian? And Robyn?" His voice was incredulous.

  There were other murmurs around the table.

  "I'm fairly certain he means our characters, Danny." Robyn said drolly, having regained her cool. "Caid and I won't suddenly be morphing into lesbians…sorry to disappoint."

  Danny looked crestfallen.

  I felt his pain. I wouldn't mind Robyn morphing into a lesbian, either.

  Liz's anger had faded into a slightly shell-shocked expression. I doubted she'd ever polled that low in anything in her career. She stared at the script, and then gently closed it.

  Uh-oh.

  It was never good when Liz did things gently.

  She stood, and looked at me for a long moment. The look on her face was wounded, as though I'd betrayed her somehow.

  It killed me.

  "Liz…" I didn't know what I would say, but I wanted to say something, anything, to stop that look.

  "I don't want to talk to you right now, Caid," she said, holding up a hand. "I can't believe you'd…" She shook her head, picked up the script, and left the room.

  "Goddamnit!" I spit out after the door had closed behind her. I tossed my script down and ran an aggravated hand through my hair. "I didn't do anything!" I rounded on Grant. "Thanks for the heads-up there, big guy. This may just fuck up our working relationship beyond repair, not to mention our friendship - a little notice would have been nice."

  The room went deathly silent.

  No one talked to Grant that way.

  Especially not some ex beer commercial actress.

  A very expendable ex beer commercial actress who picked an extremely stupid time to lose her temper.

  Under the table, Robyn grabbed my thigh and squeezed hard, telling me without words to shut the hell up.

  I took several deep breaths, trying to regain control. Grant watched me through narrowed eyes.

  "Grant," Robyn said, in a tone I'd never heard before. It was soaked in promise, hinted at fantasies come true, and had every man in the room shifting uncomfortably in their seats. It was sex and heat and forbidden things…meant to get attention, then get Robyn whatever she wanted.

  Damn. I needed a trick like that.

  "Grant, do you think that Caid and I could talk with you privately after we finish the read? I think there are some things we need to discuss." Her smile promised everything that her voice had, and more.

  Goddamn. And I thought Liz was good at this.

  I pried her hand off my thigh and gently placed it back in her lap. Even though I was aware of its manipulative intent, I was far from immune to Robyn's sudden come-and-get-it aura. Her hand on that area of my anatomy…I could do without it.

  She glanced at me quickly and I gave her a tight smile, assuring her that I was back in control of my suicidal, producer-insulting urges.

  "Of course, Robyn," Grant agreed obediently, forgetting my transgressions for the moment. He looked around the table. "In fact, why don't we wrap this up? Read through the rest on your own, let Kenny or Brenda know if you've got any comments or suggestions before the writer's meeting, tomorrow at two. Okay?"

  From the pitying looks thrown my way as the others left the room, I knew that I needed to administer a major dose of damage control.

  Pucker lips and apply to insulted ass, STAT.

  As the last writer filed from the room, I rose from my chair, ignoring Robyn's warning look.

  I used to work in the service industry. Ass kissing was something of a specialty of mine.

  Now I don't have the classic beauty of Robyn or Liz, but I have big, expressive green eyes and a full, wide mouth recently been deemed one of televisions twenty most kissable. I turned those big eyes on Grant and arranged my face in a properly sorrowful expression.

  "Grant, I am so sorry I snapped at you. I was upset at Liz's reaction, but that's absolutely no reason to speak to you that way." I laid a hand on his arm. "I hope you can accept my apology. I promise it will never, ever happen again."

  After several moments of me kneeling beside him, in essence begging for forgiveness, Grant nodded. "See that it doesn't, Caid. See that it doesn't."

  "It won't." I squeezed his arm in thanks and straightened, smiling slightly at Robyn's surprised expression.

  I guess I couldn't fault her for her surprise; until recently, she was under the impression that I had the intellectual and maturity level of a twelve-year-old.

  I walked back to my chair and dropped into it heavily, the problem with Liz filling my thoughts now that my job was re-secured.

  I forgot all about that kissing Robyn in front of a bunch of cameras thing. Not for long.

  "Grant," Robyn was saying, "about this script. I really wish you had run it by us before okaying a script. This is something I'll need to talk over with Mark." Mark Goodhead was her agent, and Robyn would want to talk to him about how this might affect her future prospects, career-wise.

  "Do you need to talk to someone, too?"
Grant asked me, dragging me back in conversation. The look on his face was predatory - the wrong answer and my groveling would be for nothing.

  Robyn had been in the business much longer than I had been, modeling for the first few years before moving into acting. Robyn Ward had enough of a name to decline this script and withstand any backlash. Caidence Harris did not. Despite the popularity of 9th Precinct, I was still a newbie in the business, and couldn't afford to turn this down. Especially after being a colossal ass to a man who could break my career with a few casual words.